THE EMERGING DEMOCRATIC MAJORITY?

[BurtWorm]

Click on the link at the bottom of this post and study the graph it will take you to. It looks like good news for Democrats (and American democracy).

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_10/009782.php

THE EMERGING DEMOCRATIC MAJORITY?....Matt Yglesias is right: this is an interesting chart. (It's too big to post on the blog, so you'll have to click on the link to see it.)

The theory behind it, I guess, is that the political climate when you're age 20 affects your party preference for your entire life. The hypothesis would go something like this: popular presidents produce a swing among 20-year-olds to their own party, and unpopular ones produce a swing in the other direction.

A look at the chart suggests this is almost true. If you push the whole thing forward by about four years, so that you're looking at 24-year-olds, it looks to me like the administrations of FDR, Truman, Kennedy/Johnson, and Clinton produced swings toward Democrats, while Jimmy Carter didn't. Likewise, Eisenhower, Reagan, and Bush Sr. produced swings toward Republicans, while Nixon/Ford, and Bush Jr. didn't. The political climate during your early 20s seems to scar you for life.

Of course, what's really most remarkable about the chart is the fantastic shift toward the Democrats in the 20-30 age group. The delta among this cohort between Democrats and Republicans is about +15 in the Democrats' favor, a bigger number than even the Vietnam/Watergate generation. It looks to me like the Christian right's social neanderthalism is causing the Republican Party to lose a generation forever.


http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2006/10/14/weekinreview/15kirk_graphic.ready.html

[Hosnon]

1. Haha! I'm 24...the LEAST Republican age!

Very interesting chart and presented very well also.

[Bucky]

2. Hmmm, not too sure about this.

Some of that is generational, of course. Younger voters are more likely to get their news (if they bother to get it at all) thru the internet, which by and large is more critical of Bush than broadcast media and more analytical overall than TV and radio news.

But also keep in mind that 24 year olds are less vulnerable to "pocketbook issue" pandering that Republicans do. Once those recent college grads start getting married and paying mortgages, many will start slipping into the Republican column.

From an analytical point of view, it would be more interesting to see how many people in each age cohort were voting for Republicans 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 years ago. That is, in what age category are we making the most gains, since those are the same voters who are most liable to slip back into voting Republican once the Democrats start cleaning up the latest GOP mess.

[BurtWorm]

3. I think the correlation between voting tendency and who was in office

when the voter was 20 is very compelling. Note that the most Republican voters reached that age when "mainstream" Republicans came to power. But those who came of age in Democratic presidencies or when the Republicans in power were corrupt or hated (Nixon, Bush II) have continued to tend Democratic.

[villager]

4. for me, it was the political climate when my age was in single digits

I was in my 20's when "St. Ronnie" was Prez, though I'd already suffered through him as a kid here in California, and boy, was I not buying any of that bullshit in the 80's... indeed, it wound up pushing me even farther left...

[BurtWorm]

5. It would be interesting to see what a poll based on those questions:

"Who was president when you were 10? Do you tend to vote D or R?"

Nixon was president when I was 10, and I've been a Democrat all my life. For what it's worth.

[villager]

6. me too, compadre...

n/t

[Patchuli]

7. LBJ here

and he was at least the strongest civil rights president. I didn't respect him for him 'Nam mistakes but I have continued as a strong Dem all these years.

[seabeyond]

8. that "Christian right's social neanderthalism" and "GREED"

have probably already effected my 9 and 11 yr old to the same degree. for such young and tender ages, they have had this in their face for too long a period. having attended a christian private school and living in very red panhandle of texas